Name:Service No:Rank:Service:Date of Birth:Place of Birth:Date of Enlistment:Age at Enlistment:Place of Enlistment:Address at Enlistment:Trade:Religion:Marital Status:Next of Kin:Date of Death:Age at Death:Memorial:Additional Information:

John Norman Smith Lieutenant-CommanderHMCS Raccoon, Royal Canadian Naval ReserveJanuary 9, 1904Portishead, Somerset, EnglandDecember 26, 193329Halifax, NSHalifax, NSMaster MarinerEpiscopalianMarriedDorothy Smith (Wife) Halifax, NSSeptember 7, 194238Halifax MemorialPanel 6Commemorated on Page 115 of the Second World War Book of RemembranceDisplayed in the Memorial Chamber of the Peace Tower in Ottawa on March 11.John Smith was the son of Frederick Hugh Smith, and Alice Smith, of Bristol, England. He lived in England until 1924 and then in the United States until 1929. He married Dorothy S. Smith in Halifax in 1929 where he lived until his enlistment. He was the father of two children. Prior to his enlistment with the Canadian Navy he was employed with the Canadian National Steamship Company as First Officer on the HMS Lady Rodney, a passenger and cargo vessel providing a service between Montreal (Halifax and Saint John in Winter) and Jamaica, calling en route at Bermuda and Nassau from 1929 until WWII. He served between December 13 , 1941 and September 7, 1942 as Master of HMCS Raccoon. He was lost, killed in action, in the sinking of HMCS Raccoon when it was torpedoed by enemy action.HMCS Raccoon was an armed yacht The ship was purchased by the Royal Canadian Navy in 1940, originally known as Halonia. In 1942 the ship was assigned to the naval base at Gaspe to patrol the St. Lawrence River and Gulf and to escort convoys of ships from Quebec to Sydney, Halifax or Newfoundland. HMCS Raccoon was sunk by the German submarine U-165 in the St. Lawrence River on September 7, 1942 while escorting Convoy QS-33. The entire ship's crew of 37 was lost.